2 Weld health providers get funding to help enroll uninsured patients

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Dec. 11 two Weld County health providers received $25,000 each for 2014 to help enroll uninsured patients in health insurance options made available by the Affordable Care Act.

The two providers — Sunrise Community Health in Evans and Plan de Salud del Valle in Fort Lupton — are among 15 other health centers in Colorado and 1,155 others across the country to receive the funding in 2014.

Plan de Salud del Valle's "priority clientele" are community members in the low-income, medically under-served population and migrant and seasonal farmworker population, according to the company's website.

Jennifer Morse, development director with Plan de Salud del Valle, said Dec. 13 that the company received their funds "three days ago," for outreach and enrollment efforts.

"It's really going to add to our current efforts," Morse said, including engaging patients to help them enroll in Colorado's heath care marketplace and Medicaid, as well as connecting both insured and uninsured patients with health care providers.

Of Sunrise Community Health's 30,483 patients in 2011, about 44 percent were uninsured, according to the company's website.

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The 17 centers in the state receiving outreach and enrollment funding expect to hire an additional 65 workers to assist more than 181,909 uninsured individuals to enroll in health coverage, according to a department news release announcing the funding.

The funding in 2014 for the Colorado health centers totals $425,000, and the department's 2013 funding for the 17 centers was $3,077,201, according to the release.

Plan de Salud del Valle received a total of $385,711 in 2013, and Sunrise Community Health received a total of $215,607 in 2013 from the department, according to the release.